138 ECONOMIC PRINCIPLES

products of such labour is, in a sense, fictitious. The full
cost of the labour is not charged against its product when
the labour derives part of its support from other sources
than the earnings of the toil which absorbs all its working
power. Some greater attention than is given it might well
be devoted to the question, of how far the community gains
from the employment of part of its labour supply under
conditions which cannot yield a return sufficient for the
maintenance of the workers. Certainly one important
reason for the hardships of women who must support
themselves by their work is found in the fact that the
supply-price of labour, in many employments supplied by
women, is not in any sense the cost of production of that
labour.

A problem, which in some respects resembles that above
discussed, is afforded by the lowest grades of unskilled
labour. There the increase of numbers proceeds with but
little regard for the relation of earnings to cost of living.
Not only is the natural increase not effectively restrained by
such prudence as influences the superior grades of labourers,
but the numbers of the class are recruited from all the
superior classes, the failures of which drift downwards to
compete for work with the unskilled. The low wages
earned by such labour in most countries are an index of the
low value of the labour to the community. The need of
society for the labour of so many of this class as are available
is not very urgent, but, so long as this does not check the
supply, it must result in hardship to the members of the
overcrowded class. The hardship is the pressure urging to
the adjustment of supply to the demand at satisfactory
wages. The soundest measures of relief would be such as
were aimed at relieving the pressure of competition in the
class, especially by raising some of its members to a higher
level of efficiency, and by checking the degradation of
members of the superior grades, The former operation, and,
in part, the latter also, would naturally be concerned with
the children rather than with the adult members of the class,
and would thus be aimed at the relief of congestion as these
grow to maturity.